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Posted: Mon 2nd Nov 2026
5 min read
Reviewed by Amanda Peters, content manager
You hired people to take some of the pressure off. So why are you still answering all the questions?
Can we give this customer a discount? Which supplier should we use? Is this good enough to send? When you go on holiday, things get held up. When you're ill, they grind to a halt.
If that sounds familiar, the likely problem is that too many decisions still depend on you. And if every decision needs your approval, your business can only grow as fast as you can manage it.
Handing over more tasks won't fix that on its own. What works is giving people responsibility for an area of the business, agreeing what success looks like and making it clear which decisions they can take themselves.
Most advice on delegation tells you to pass on bookkeeping, social media and admin. That helps, but the questions still come back to you.
Imagine your assistant is now sending invoices. A client asks for 60-day payment terms. Who decides? You do.
You've handed over the task, but not the decisions that come with it.
There's a big difference between asking someone to send invoices and asking them to make sure customers pay on time. The first is a job. The second is an outcome they can own, including the day-to-day decisions.
Your team may simply be unsure how far their authority goes. If nobody has explained what they can decide, asking you is the safest option.
For 20 years, I ran CNIguard, a business that deployed sensors across electricity and water networks.
No one person could watch every sensor and deal with every alert. Instead, alerts went to the right people, who knew what they were authorised to do. Most issues were dealt with there and then; only certain problems were escalated.
The same applies to a small business. You need the right information to reach the right person, and that person needs to know what they can do about it.
The aim is to be confident that the important things are being handled, even when you aren't watching.
Start by breaking your business into four or five areas:
Sales
Delivery - making or providing what you sell
Customer service
Finance
People
Give each area a named owner. Not a committee, not “the team”. One person responsible for making sure things run properly.
Next, agree on two or three simple measures that tell you whether each area is doing well.
For example:
A bakery: Orders delivered on time and customer complaints each week.
An online shop: The percentage of customer emails answered within one working day.
In my recent Enterprise Nation Lunch and Learn, I showed how to bring measures like these together into a quick picture of how the business is performing.
Once you know who's looking after what, you can stop checking every detail yourself. If the numbers look healthy, let people get on with it. If something starts to slip, you have a reason to step in.
That's how you stay in control without being involved in everything.
Delegation often goes wrong here: someone is given responsibility, but nobody explains what they're allowed to decide.
Take 10 minutes with the area's owner to list the decisions that regularly come up, then sort them into three groups.
Routine decisions they make without asking you. For example, reordering stock up to £200, approving refunds up to £50 or rearranging a missed delivery.
They decide and tell you afterwards, or bring you a recommendation first. For example, refunds between £50 and £150 or bringing in a regular freelancer.
For example, changing prices, refunds above £150, signing contracts above an agreed value or dealing with something that carries a significant legal or reputational risk.
Be honest about what really needs to stay with you. Sometimes there's a good reason. Sometimes it's just habit, and that isn't a good reason.
Put clear limits in writing. “You can approve refunds up to £50” gives someone something they can work with.
Trusting your team means agreeing the boundaries and then letting people get on with it.
Agree in advance which situations need your attention. Ask the person to come back to you when:
A key measure is off track for two weeks running
A decision would exceed their agreed limit
An important customer or supplier is unhappy
There's a legal, safety or serious cash flow risk
Everything else can wait for a regular 15-minute check-in to review the measures and agree any changes.
At some point, someone will make a decision you wouldn't have made.
Your first instinct might be to take the responsibility back. Instead, ask yourself three questions:
Were the limits clear?
Did the measures give us any warning that something was going wrong?
Did the person have the information and support they needed to make a good decision?
Often, the fix is to clarify the rules, improve the information available or provide a bit more guidance.
I learnt this in my own coaching business. I asked a colleague to find out how clients experienced our service. The first attempt was a fairly generic satisfaction survey. The responses were positive but told us little about what to change.
My first reaction was to take the job back. Instead, we went through the responses together. I explained that we wanted to know where clients were getting stuck and what we could do differently. We also agreed on clear boundaries on what should never be asked about private coaching conversations.
My colleague revised the questions and ran the next round independently. Over time, that became a repeatable process: collect feedback, identify common themes and recommend practical improvements.
The proportion of client feedback that led to a measurable improvement rose from 10% to 60%. I now receive a short summary instead of making every call myself.
When someone gets something wrong, improve the process rather than take the responsibility away.
That's how people learn, and how routine decisions gradually stop landing on your desk.
Fill in a one-page template like the one below for each area you hand over. The example is for an online gift shop where Priya looks after customer service.
| Template | Example: online gift shop |
|---|---|
| Area | Customer service |
| Owner | Priya |
| Measures (two or three) | Emails answered within one working day; refunds each week; complaints each week |
| Decisions they make alone | Replace damaged items; change delivery dates; approve refunds up to £50 |
| Decisions to share | Refunds of £50–£150: check with you first |
| Decisions you keep | Refunds above £150; changes to the returns policy |
| When it comes back to you | Requests over her limit; serious public complaints; a measure off track for two weeks |
| Check-in | Mondays, 15 minutes, reviewing the numbers |
The figures are examples. Choose limits that suit your business and your cash position. Agree the template together. Talk it through in person and give them a chance to raise anything they're unsure about.
Week 1: Find the biggest bottleneck
For one week, note the questions and decisions that come to you. Which area generates the most interruptions? Start there.
Week 2: Agree on the rules
Sit down with that person and complete the template.
Week 3: Let them run it
Hold your first 15-minute check-in. When a question comes to you, ask, “What do you think we should do?” before answering. Step in only when an agreed escalation rule applies.
Week 4: Review and adjust
Look at the questions that still came back to you. Were they genuinely outside the person's authority, or were the rules unclear?
Where appropriate, move at least one decision from “keep” to “share”, or from “share” to “let go”.
Then choose next month's area.
Your business still needs your judgement, experience and direction. But it doesn't need you to approve every refund, answer every customer query or decide every routine issue.
The aim is a business where people know what they own, decisions don't wait for you, and you can take a day off without everything grinding to a halt.
Because the real test of delegation isn't how much work you've handed over. It's how much of the business can keep moving without you.
